masterpoobaa wrote:Ahhh I see.So if it were a once off weapon, would it not have been more effective to drop it on Stormwind?

No horde safe harbor area close enough to Stormwind.

there is the one in STV, but it is more of an outpost than a major city it would be like the us trying to go through menithal harbor to get to horde territory

Brekkie:Tanks are like shitty DPS. And healers are like REALLY distracted DPSAmirya:Why yes, your penis is longer than his because you hit 30k dps in the first 10 seconds. But guess what? That raid boss has a dick bigger than your ego. Flex:I don't make mistakes. I execute carefully planned strategic group wipes.Levie:(in /g) It's weird, I have a collar and I dont know where I got it from, Worgen are kinky!Levie:Drunk Lev goes and does what he pleases just to annoy sober Lev.Sagara:You see, you need to *spread* the bun before you insert the hot dog.

Sagara wrote:Which does tie with their mentionning of pre-launch events being a bit of a waste for 1-2 weeks of game time.

Except that pre-expansion launches DO generally seem to get people pretty hyped for the next expansion. It's always worked for me anyway. But maybe that's their problem. They realized they were only getting people excited who already had subscriptions... it's pretty much inevitable that all of us who are currently subbed will also be playing MoP. They don't need to get us excited anymore... they've already got us hooked.

The problem is, it's almost having the opposite effect for me. I'm already losing interest in the game, and a lack of a decent prelaunch doesn't really make things any better. I can only hope MoP renews my interest or else I'll have to find something else to do with my free time.

Sagara wrote:Which does tie with their mentionning of pre-launch events being a bit of a waste for 1-2 weeks of game time.

Except that pre-expansion launches DO generally seem to get people pretty hyped for the next expansion. It's always worked for me anyway. But maybe that's their problem. They realized they were only getting people excited who already had subscriptions... it's pretty much inevitable that all of us who are currently subbed will also be playing MoP. They don't need to get us excited anymore... they've already got us hooked.

The problem is, it's almost having the opposite effect for me. I'm already losing interest in the game, and a lack of a decent prelaunch doesn't really make things any better. I can only hope MoP renews my interest or else I'll have to find something else to do with my free time.

Yeah but see, they've already won your dollar. You're already planning to buy the expansion and try it out before making a decision. The lack of a prelaunch event isn't curtailing you from buying the expansion - you're only delaying judgement until you've tried the product out (at which point, you've already paid for it plus a month of a subscription). They don't have to win you over with prelaunch, they can do that with their new content, so they've got zero incentive to entice you any further since MoP may very well do that itself.

I think this starts to create a really interesting dynamic in the MMO market. The holes in Blizz's storytelling and lore is starting to show now, with competitors like Star Wars and Guild Wars 2 showing just what can be done with both personal and world stories. But Blizz has the end game for raiding far in advance of everyone else, and is introducing some scintillating new content with Challenge Modes.

Personally, I am not sure where I want to spend my time at the moment. I have enough for about 13/14 hours of playtime a week, which I'll want to dedicate to one game. Although the scenario isn't meant to captivate or draw in, it doesn't really fill me with joy either. It's no Claw Island

I tanked the scenario on my alts last night and it was much more engaging. Reading the blue post that the health of the mobs was doubled explains why. The lore element is badly done, but from a gameplay perspective, it was massively undertuned for L85 in DS gear.

Nikachelle wrote:Except that pre-expansion launches DO generally seem to get people pretty hyped for the next expansion. It's always worked for me anyway. But maybe that's their problem. They realized they were only getting people excited who already had subscriptions... it's pretty much inevitable that all of us who are currently subbed will also be playing MoP. They don't need to get us excited anymore... they've already got us hooked.

The problem is, it's almost having the opposite effect for me. I'm already losing interest in the game, and a lack of a decent prelaunch doesn't really make things any better. I can only hope MoP renews my interest or else I'll have to find something else to do with my free time.

Yeah but see, they've already won your dollar. You're already planning to buy the expansion and try it out before making a decision. The lack of a prelaunch event isn't curtailing you from buying the expansion - you're only delaying judgement until you've tried the product out (at which point, you've already paid for it plus a month of a subscription). They don't have to win you over with prelaunch, they can do that with their new content, so they've got zero incentive to entice you any further since MoP may very well do that itself.

I canceled my MOP collector's edition preorder yesterday. I am no longer giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt because they no longer deserve it after the annual pass debacle; the last year has completely wrecked my perception of them. If feedback on here is good (and I really hope it is because I still love playing prot paladin, I think the MOP design for our class is exceptional) only then will I buy MOP.

The game needs some serious TLC and I find it desperately sad that it is not being given any. Abandoning the game for nearly a year with the excuse that they are focusing 100% on an expansion is not acceptable.

If Theramore's destruction had a proper event with new quests and talky events in capitals opening up each week showing the story from the book, if the Abyssal Maw raid had launched alongside Firelands (I know the official reason why before anyone points it out), if War of the Ancients had been a T13 raid alongside a higher quality Dragon Soul... then I would know that they still care about WoW. The sad thing is I bet a lot of people on the WoW development team wanted to do all the above but were overruled and not given the people to make it happen. Right now it feels like the bare minimum is done, the B-Teamers keeping it on life support to tide us over until Titan comes out.

They can't just try to draw the line under Cataclysm and say MOP will be great... I paid £60 for the game and all the subscription fees for something Blizzard just want to brush under the carpet. They no longer deserve my blind faith.

Yeah but see, they've already won your dollar. You're already planning to buy the expansion and try it out before making a decision. The lack of a prelaunch event isn't curtailing you from buying the expansion - you're only delaying judgement until you've tried the product out (at which point, you've already paid for it plus a month of a subscription). They don't have to win you over with prelaunch, they can do that with their new content, so they've got zero incentive to entice you any further since MoP may very well do that itself.

I canceled my MOP collector's edition preorder yesterday. I am no longer giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt because they no longer deserve it after the annual pass debacle; the last year has completely wrecked my perception of them. If feedback on here is good (and I really hope it is because I still love playing prot paladin, I think the MOP design for our class is exceptional) only then will I buy MOP.

The game needs some serious TLC and I find it desperately sad that it is not being given any. Abandoning the game for nearly a year with the excuse that they are focusing 100% on an expansion is not acceptable.

If Theramore's destruction had a proper event with new quests and talky events in capitals opening up each week showing the story from the book, if the Abyssal Maw raid had launched alongside Firelands (I know the official reason why before anyone points it out), if War of the Ancients had been a T13 raid alongside a higher quality Dragon Soul... then I would know that they still care about WoW. The sad thing is I bet a lot of people on the WoW development team wanted to do all the above but were overruled and not given the people to make it happen. Right now it feels like the bare minimum is done, the B-Teamers keeping it on life support to tide us over until Titan comes out.

They can't just try to draw the line under Cataclysm and say MOP will be great... I paid £60 for the game and all the subscription fees for something Blizzard just want to brush under the carpet. They no longer deserve my blind faith.

Well, I have to say i agree this post completely.. I love Blizzard and their games more than any other game company but their development and givings getting so low and low every each day and this makes me so unhappy.. World of Warcraft deserves more than this and Blizzard not giving this anymore, I've cancelled my preorder aswell.. They don't deserve it anymore.

As a scenario, I like the new event. As a pre-launch event I was underwhelmed. I don't think it was terrible in that it did well for what it was, but I wish they didn't do the pre-launch like they did. I understand they want to showcase scenarios as a preview to the expansion, but I don't think it was as good as a full pre-launch event idea. There needed to be something more and grandiose.

econ21 wrote:it was massively undertuned for L85 in DS gear.

Well, remember it was more tuned for peeps with 353 gear (troll heroics), rather than 397, I still agree with you though that it was still a bit undertuned, even for that level. DS gear definitely makes it a lot easier, but being on my server, I got to run on my alts with a lot of "at-ilvl" pugs and it was harder than on my main with good gear. Still it could have been slightly harder. I am guessing they have to tune it below a bit to account for groups of all clothy casters in 353 gear that don't know each other in addition to more balanced groups.

Lieris wrote:I canceled my MOP collector's edition preorder yesterday. I am no longer giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt because they no longer deserve it after the annual pass debacle;

What was the debacle?

A one year contract taken in good faith by over a million people with the understanding that Blizzard will provide raid patches and expansions much more regularly. Instead all we had was Dragon Soul, a mediocre 8 boss raid with no new environments and 6 recycled boss models like Deathwing's final chapter was merely an afterthought, for 10 months. They abandoned Cataclysm and still couldn't get MOP out any sooner.

My feeling is that it was a little too short and easy. If the scenario were longer and showed more of the story, it might not have been as lackluster, and would have done a decent job of replacing a pre-launch event.

Spoilers:For example, from an Alliance perspective: if you started pre-destruction of Theramore, your band of heroes rushes off to the docks to deal with the ships, thinking that's the main threat (meanwhile, the horde group goes in to free the blood elf NPC). After dealing with the ships and a few mini-bosses, the explosion happens. Cutscene.

You wake up on the dockside, surrounded by dead sailors (Alliance and Horde alike). Now you get to see the destruction, because minutes before you were running around in an in-tact version of Theramore. You ride to the bomb, the path littered with bodies, and meet Jaina there. Now you get the second half of the scenario, where you take out the siege engines as a delay tactic (perhaps more than one of them?). And then finally, you defend Jaina while she recovers the iris.

Horde version would have the players fighting through the remaining guards and heroes (Marcus Jonathan, maybe?) to try and get to the bomb and recover the iris. Obviously they don't succeed, Jaina teleporting away with her defenders at the last second. But it would give Horde players the chance to fight through the streets littered with casualties as well, forcing them to think a bit and self-reflect. "Holy Crap, what did we just do for Garrosh here? We helped do this." It would fit pretty thematically given what we know will happen at the end of MoP.

The other thing they could have done, not story related, was make more interesting enemies. On my rogue, it was pretty boring, because everything died so fast that I couldn't do much of a rotation. I'm OK with waves of enemies and an AoE-fest, but the whole scenario was that way. Even the bosses died so quickly I could barely do more than one or two finishers.

I'd rather have seen more single-mob pulls. They can have loads of health and just do weak damage to compensate, that's fine. Or have more abilities like one of the ship captains, where he has a "Blade Barrier" effect that reflects all damage and makes him immune, but roots him. A few more single-pull mobs with interesting effects would have been more fun.

As it is, you can destroy that place with 2-3 rogues. I can solo two of the ships with ease on my Rogue (barely LFR geared), so in our guild runs I would take out two of the ships while the other two took out the middle one and the other captain. We got it down to a 6-ish minute clear, I think. I shudder to think what 3 geared and skilled Rogues (I'm pretty bad @ Rogue) could do.

Lieris wrote:I canceled my MOP collector's edition preorder yesterday. I am no longer giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt because they no longer deserve it after the annual pass debacle;

What was the debacle?

A one year contract taken in good faith by over a million people with the understanding that Blizzard will provide raid patches and expansions much more regularly. Instead all we had was Dragon Soul, a mediocre 8 boss raid with no new environments and 6 recycled boss models like Deathwing's final chapter was merely an afterthought, for 10 months. They abandoned Cataclysm and still couldn't get MOP out any sooner.

They never promised you a rose garden.. they promised a pony and beta access, and that's about it. And free D3. And people signed up for part or all of that combination.

If you really expected taurens and gnomes living together in harmony and 27-boss dungeons, you really are a dreamer.

I bought it for the beta access, since I was gonna play anyway, D3 was a throw-in, that paid for my MoP, so the annual pass actually got me MoP for free.

Yes, DS was lame and short. Yes, the Theramore scenario is lame. But from all I've seen of T14, things are looking really good. I am certainly concerned that the siege of Org will become another DS, but we'll have to wait and see.

But there's so much information out now on T14 and all the starter content that your rant really seems like an excuse to go ahead and quit. Which is fine. If it's time and time. But leave the high-horse at the door. It's a video game.

Amirya wrote:... because everyone needs a Catagonskin rug.

twinkfist wrote:i feel bad for the Mogu...having to deal with alcoholic bears.

Lieris wrote:A one year contract taken in good faith by over a million people with the understanding that Blizzard will provide raid patches and expansions much more regularly. Instead all we had was Dragon Soul, a mediocre 8 boss raid with no new environments and 6 recycled boss models like Deathwing's final chapter was merely an afterthought, for 10 months. They abandoned Cataclysm and still couldn't get MOP out any sooner.

Yeah, they never promised anything for WoW other than the mount. You agreed to keep your subscription for a year in return for the mount, guaranteed beta access, and a free game, and got what you signed up for.

theckhd wrote:My feeling is that it was a little too short and easy. If the scenario were longer and showed more of the story, it might not have been as lackluster, and would have done a decent job of replacing a pre-launch event.

They touched on this in the Best Buy Q&A. Basically they didn't want to put too much story in the actual scenario because they just wanted to let players get to the action part, which, to me, is somewhat understandable given the violent reactions players have had to any form of "sit through dialog" part of instanced content. It sounds like for any future event based scenarios they'll do similar to what they did with the Troll heroics and have a quest chain surrounding it.

As for your suggested content there's two ways it can work for alliance characters to actually survive the bomb, it is made clear that no one survived. One, doing a Battle of Theramore where at the end you accompany the scouting party going after the escaped traitor where you get sent out into Dustwallow and then see the cutscene and the other is the post bombing event, which is close enough to the novel.

We live in a society where people born on third base constantly try to steal second, yet we expect people born with two strikes against them to hit a homerun on the first pitch.

Flex wrote:As for your suggested content there's two ways it can work for alliance characters to actually survive the bomb, it is made clear that no one survived. One, doing a Battle of Theramore where at the end you accompany the scouting party going after the escaped traitor where you get sent out into Dustwallow and then see the cutscene and the other is the post bombing event, which is close enough to the novel.

There are still ways around that... have the PoV be from a ship still a ways out to sea, and see the bomb from afar (similar to the quest leading you to Vash), or perhaps as captured prisoners that escape from the horde after the bomb is dropped.

But the current land on the dock, fight 15 waves of horde, get a treasure bag, is lame. Seems very last-minute.

My suspicion is that they had something larger planned, and it just didn't work.

Amirya wrote:... because everyone needs a Catagonskin rug.

twinkfist wrote:i feel bad for the Mogu...having to deal with alcoholic bears.